Cappenberger Barbarossakopf
The Cappenberger Barbarossakopf is a portrait bust of Emperor Friedrich I Barbarossa made of gilded bronze. It is considered to be the first independent portrayal of Western art since the Carolingian era . The head was rededicated as a head reliquary in the 12th century . Today it is in the church treasury of the collegiate church of St. Johannes Evangelist in Cappenberg near Lünen , the former monastery church of the Premonstratensian monastery and today's Catholic parish church.
description
The portrait is 31.4 cm high and weighs 4.6 kg. It consists of two parts, an architectural substructure and above it the head of a younger, bearded man standing on a neck that widens downwards. The material of the head is copper or brass , which is now gold-plated.
The pedestal
The base rests on four feet in the shape of kites that support an octagonal plate. The slab is framed by a crenellated wall, which is reinforced with a turret at every other corner. The turrets are alternately round and square. Between the turrets at the front and at the sides above the free corners there is a figure of an angel kneeling on one knee with his arms raised with his palms facing outwards. There is no figure of an angel on the back; instead, on the battlements, there is the inscription OTTO in niello . The angel figures appear to be wearing an upper ring that actually rests on a lantern in the center of the lower plate. The upper ring is round and also crenellated, on it is the inscription APOCALISTA DATV TIBI MV SVS ATVM , dissolved Apocalista datum tibi munus suscipe gratum et pius ottoni succurre precando datori (German: Take, o seer of revelation, the gift given to you as welcome and piously hasten to help the giver Otto through intercession ). With Otto the godfather of Friedrich was meant. The top crenellated rim surrounds a plate with two rectangular recesses for pegs cast on the head part. Since the tenons are cast with the head, it cannot stand without a base.
The head
The headboard is hollow but has been filled with relics. The man looks directly at the viewer, his eyes are wide open, silver-plated and made using Niellotechnik ; however, this is a later repair. The curly hair is held together by a headband. As rivet holes show, the head originally wore a headdress, probably a diadem. Due to the idiosyncratic design and the asymmetrical facial features, the head has portraits. The head bears several Latin inscriptions on the neck and the upper battlements of the substructure, which were added when it was converted into a reliquary. The upper band bears the inscription HIC QD SERVET DE CRINE IOHIS HABETVR , dissolved Hic quod servetur de crine Johannes habetur , German What is preserved here is from the head of Johannes , the lower TE PCE PVLSANTES EXAVDI SCE IOHES , dissolved te prece pulsantes exaudi sancte Johannes (German Listen, holy Johannes, who harass you with prayer ). The inscriptions are much more carefully executed than those on the base.
The Barbarossa head is based on ingenious proportions. It can be divided vertically into quarters, each measuring 71 mm: parting to the root of the nose, the root of the nose to the chin, chin to the lower edge of the neck ring and the base itself. The number four also recurs in other parts of the work of art: four dragons carry it , four towers and originally probably four angels on the pinnacle wreath made of 16 pinnacles (4 × 4); the lantern that supports the level of the substructure is also square.
The content
Originally, the reliquary probably contained relics of the Evangelist Johannes , the patron of the Cappenberg monastery church. Today it contains several small packages of relics wrapped in cloth that cannot be identified because the cedulae have been removed. An analysis of the cloth coverings showed that the relics did not get into the head all at once. The oldest fabrics come from the 12th century, the youngest from the 14th century. The head was used as a reliquary for centuries; the relics inlaid by Otto von Cappenberg were repeatedly added in the Cappenberg monastery.
Identification and iconography
The exact date of manufacture of the head is unknown, but must be between 1155 (Frederick's coronation as emperor) and 1171 (Otto von Cappenberg's death). The head is mentioned for the first time in a document from the Cappenberg monastery from 1171 (Cappenberg archive, document 13) as capud argenteum ad imperatoris formatum effigiem , i.e. as a silver head shaped after the portrait of the emperor. In the deed, Otto donated the head, a silver bowl (today called Frederick I's baptismal bowl), a cross and a goblet (both lost) to the Cappenberg monastery. The fact that the above-mentioned silver head is identical to today's golden head results from the complex iconography of the work: The upper crenellated crown can be interpreted as Roma aurea , the lower as Heavenly Jerusalem . The alleged original diadem was a symbol of power. As can be seen in profile, the head has raised its eyes to the sky; Such a view of the sky was typical for depictions of the first Christian emperor Constantine I. Frederick I presented himself politically inopportune as a ruler over Roma who was in direct relation to God. It is possible that Barbarossa with the gift of the head to Otto to the emperor of antiquity, who had also given portraits of themselves to deserving people.
Object history
Otto von Cappenberg stayed in the Duchy of Swabia when the eldest son of Duke Friedrich II , who later became Emperor Friedrich I Barbarossa, was born. Otto was therefore given the honor of being his godfather. As a reminder of this event, the emperor later had the Barbarossa head made and gave it and the baptismal bowl as a gift to his godfather, possibly for Easter 1156, which Friedrich celebrated in Münster . Otto von Cappenberg had been provost of the Cappenberg monastery since 1156, which he probably founded as atonement for his involvement in the storming of Münster in 1121 (he and his brother Gottfried were considered to be the culprit for the burning down of the cathedral in Münster). Since Otto von Cappenberg bequeathed his property to the Premonstratensian Order, the originally silver-plated head came into the possession of the church, was gilded and converted into a reliquary. According to the Annales Capenbergenses from the beginning of the 18th century, the head was kept in the reliquary on the north side of the choir of the collegiate church. Presumably, the reliquary was placed on certain occasions such as the church consecration festival, the patronage festival and the day of remembrance of Gottfried von Cappenberg, who was venerated as a saint, on his tomb.
After its rediscovery in 1882 by Augustin Hüsing , it was initially thought to be a St. John's reliquary; identification with Friedrich I took place in 1886 by Friedrich Philippi .
The head is one of the most famous works of art from the Staufer period. In 1977 it was the symbol of the Staufer year in Baden-Württemberg and as such was shown on the multi-volume anniversary catalog and on a postage stamp of the German Federal Post Office.
literature
- Edeltraud Balzer: The Cappenberger Barbarossakopf. History, gift occasion and functions. In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien , Vol. 46 (2012), pp. 241–299.
- Manuela Beer, Birgitta Falk, Andrea von Hülsen-Esch, Susan Marti, Petra Marx, Barbara Rommé, Hiltrud Westermann-Angerhausen (eds.): Barbarossa-Kopf. In: Beautiful NRW. 100 masterpieces of medieval art. Klartext Verlag, Essen 2009, ISBN 978-3-8375-0080-6 .
- Herbert Grundmann : The Cappenberger Barbarossakopf and the beginnings of the Cappenberg monastery (= Münster research. Vol. 12). Böhlau, Cologne a. a. 1959.
- Caroline Horch: … caput argenteum, ad imperatoris formatum effigiem… The Cappenberg Barbarossa head: picture or portrait? In: Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (Ed.): AufRuhr 1225! Knights, castles and intrigues - The Middle Ages on the Rhine and Ruhr, catalog of the exhibition in Herne February 27 - November 28, 2010. Mainz 2010, pp. 107–121.
- Caroline Horch: In the image of the emperor. Functions and meanings of the Cappenberg Barbarossa head (= studies on art. Vol. 15). Böhlau, Cologne a. a. 2013, ISBN 978-3-412-20346-7 .
Web links
- Dankwart Guratzsch, What does the Emperor's nose tell us? Welt Online February 23, 2011
- Brigitte Paschedag: The emperor and his golden head - The Cappenberg collegiate church. Autumn sheet No. 37, December 2004.
Remarks
- ↑ The time of the Hohenstaufen. Catalog of the exhibition, Stuttgart 1977, vol. I, p. 394f.
- ↑ a b Knut Görich : Friedrich Barbarossa: A biography. Munich 2011, p. 644.
- ↑ a b c Caroline Horch: … caput argenteum, ad imperatoris formatum effigiem… The Cappenberg Barbarossa head: picture or portrait? In: Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (Ed.): AufRuhr 1225! Knights, castles and intrigues - The Middle Ages on the Rhine and Ruhr, catalog of the exhibition in Herne February 27 - November 28, 2010. Mainz 2010, p. 107–121, here: p. 111.
- ↑ Caroline Horch: … caput argenteum, ad imperatoris formatum effigiem… The Cappenberger Barbarossakopf: picture or portrait? In: Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (Ed.): AufRuhr 1225! Knights, castles and intrigues - The Middle Ages on the Rhine and Ruhr, catalog of the exhibition in Herne February 27 - November 28, 2010. Mainz 2010, p. 107–121, here: p. 116.
- ^ Knut Görich: Friedrich Barbarossa: A biography. Munich 2011, p. 645.